Sci-Fi – Reel Film Chronicles

Extinction

[ 2018 – Ben Young – 96 min ] The 2018 Netflix sci-fi film Extinction holds the distinction of being one of the films that I only discover by perusing the depths of the app, in what I can only describe as a terrifying gauntlet of finding a movie suitable to watch with my parents. It’s quite a daunting task to find a so-called “good” movie that satisfies the interests of both my discerning parents, and I’m sure many fellow film enthusiasts can relate to this challenge. At the beginning of every movie now, there’s a tense few minutes where I wonder if my mother will hit that pause button and ask if this “gets better” and I drag my phone out to find another candidate, as a movie is tossed to the bin of dismissal. Extinction, I’m glad to report, passed the five minute test, and seemed to hold our collective interest (save for my father, who is inevitably going to fall asleep regardless of a film’s quality). The star power of Michael Peña and Lizzy Caplan caught my attention and…

Latitude Zero

[ 1969 – Ishirō Honda – 89 min ] In following Tears_in_Rain’s excellent Godzilla & Friends Marathon list (boxd.it/2GRQW) I’ve really taken an appreciation in the (somewhat) non-monster films, and the world of super powerful submarines. Latitude Zero unexpectedly delivers me another great sub, but also a very Wakanda-ish civilization hiding at the bottom of the ocean living their best lives – and they are very long lives. Every Thursday night I put on one of these films, and I must say I was taken aback at first that the film was entirely in English, but glad to see that there wasn’t any egregious dubbing, in fact quite the opposite: the Japanese actors were speaking English throughout, and the usual tomfoolery and outlandish plots and characters were still fully intact to fit alongside the other sci-fi entries of this era. Dr. Malic is delightfully evil, bringing along some wonderfully deranged monsters (mostly all regular size, I should note) and his own advanced submarine that just can’t quite compete with the good guys, but his diabolical plans and go-to attitude doesn’t let…

Captain America: The First Avenger

Year: 2011 | Dir: Joe Johnston | Runtime: 124m If I didn’t care about The Avengers in my youthful comic book collecting days, then I cared even less for Captain America. I would write him off as a relatively flat, simple and boring hero that was completely boring to my younger self; it’s no secret that when I pictured myself as a Marvel hero on the playground and in my imagination, it was a Wolverine-esque indestructible mutant with cool cybernetics that pulled from my favourite sci-fi films. Or maybe that was a secret. Either way, I never once picked up a Captain America comic, allowing only his cameos in other books and his depictions in pop culture as my basis for my (poor) opinion. When the film was announced, I did not approach with any excitement save that this was the next entry in the great experiment that was the Marvel Cinematic Universe and a lead in to the properly gigantic Avengers film. So when I came out of the theatre, I gave my head a shake and realized this…

Tremors

The moment I saw that a new 4K, special edition of Tremors was announced and coming out, I was online securing my preorder. It’s not often a film announcement gets me excited, but here I was, plunking down a relatively serious amount of money for a boxed edition of a film that I had honestly kind of forgotten about. Obviously, my childhood love for the film rushed forward and took charge: sometimes there are just those films that spur you to action, and Tremors is – apparently – one of those. Does anyone remember Betamax? The alternative format to VHS in the 80s and early 90s, Beta certainly had a comfortable spot in my families home: the basement television. Along with that top, spring loading player came a library of verifiable 80s movies and dubs, including a deep library of Looney Tunes cartoons, random Godzilla movies, a few films like Firebirds, and of course: Tremors. When that package arrived in the mail the other week, I quickly took in the nostalgia of the films imagery as presented in a boxed…

Red Planet

If you had to choose a movie to aggressively push out the door from the party that was the 1990’s, then I guess it would have to be Antony Hoffman’s Red Planet, starring Carrie-Anne Moss, Tom Sizemore and Val Kilmer in a perilously blundered trip to Mars. With this much nineties star power fueling the trip, I could see myself and friends eagerly going to see this on a crisp November evening, expecting high stakes sci-fi adventure, featuring the latest special effects and near-future fantasy of humanity’s quest to step foot on our planetary neighbour. Indeed, the poster hints at a silhouetted menace awaiting our crew, as our fearless Kilmer drags his crewmate across the arid landscape toward a multi-legged monster, all drenched in blood red, speaks volumes for intriguing poster design and an action packed thriller at hand. Just as quickly as I can envision us heading into that theatre, I can imagine the group of us solemnly leaving the multiplex with, scratching our heads, while somebody said “at least we got to see Carrie-Anne Moss topless” while the rest…

Synchronic

Synchronic is no different. Which is to say, it’s very different. But still the same. It’s time travel, so admittedly, there’s going to be some head scratching. The best advice I can give when engaging with any story involving time travel is to quote the late, great Hunter S. Thompson: “Buy the ticket, take the ride…” Synchronic is the fourth feature film from Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson, and one of the few movies I was truly looking forward to in 2021 (and in 2020, but the less said about that particular historical period, probably the better). Not just because I’m a sucker for a good time travel film (or even a bad one), but because Moorhead and Benson have established themselves in the indie film circuit as men of a visionary nature and a distinctive voice. I was hooked immediately after watching their debut, Resolution, last year and was similarly impressed/enamoured with their follow-up to their follow-up movie, The Endless, and their just plain follow-up, Spring. Though Resolution and The Endless have roots reaching deep into the fertile soils of both science fiction and horror (I couldn’t help shake the feeling after watching Resolution and The Endless and Ari Aster’s Hereditary and Midsommar in the…

Tremors 2: Aftershocks

Certainly nobody, including myself, would have expected anything but the worst from the followup to such a beloved classic film such as Tremors. Indeed, nobody asked for it but here we are, thirty years later and a barrage of sequels that shows no signs of letting up. So, with my one hand buried in a bowl of popcorn and my other hand clutching a king-size soda, I put on Aftershocks with the foregone conclusion that this was going to be bad. As the film started – between mouthfuls of snacks – I found myself scoffing and eyerolling as I bore witness to this train wreck. While Kevin Bacon would obviously bow out of the series immediately, he is replaced by a bit of a Bacon-esque character to join in Fred Ward’s Earl, as the two are tasked with taking out a few of the graboids in a Mexico oil field. And it seems like they got things figured out, until they don’t: Earl and Grady encounter a sick, non-aggressive graboid and in moments, their entire operation is overwhelmed by new,…

Fire in the Sky

I’ll be completely honest with you: growing up, I was afraid of aliens. There was an ambiguous fear instilled upon me, no doubt seeded by the weird sci-fi films my dad exposed me to as a child; it wasn’t so much a fear of something specific, it was just the horror of seeing an actual alien, or spacecraft, invade my reality that seemed to have me on edge. And perhaps that’s just it: it was a fear of disrupting the regular routine of my life, or something, I’m not sure. I remember driving home one night in the backseat and seeing these lights in the distance search the skies. I was immediately on alert, my mind teeming to life with all he horrific possibilities that it could manifest, but never truly giving thought that it was anything but aliens. They were spotlights from a business in the city, just programmed to pan back and forth in unison. With the fear of aliens and extraterrestrial invasion being so prominent in my mind, I certainly went out of my way to go review even…